Ears and Eyes
by Charlie's Rat
Summary: Hinata wonders why Sakura knows that Naruto has gotten himself drunk. But she'l listen to him, she'll be his eyes and ears. Mild NaruHina NH, implied NejiTen Silly fluff and topless Naruto! For RickyUzumaki


_For Ricardo (RickyUzumaki) who asked for NaruHina; broken heart. - Cool ... How about one with Naruto getting his heart broken and Hinata being there to help him pick up the pieces? - So here you are RickyUzumaki! :) First request of hopefully many more to come. _

_Ps : They are articulate drunks ; ) No flaming please. Intoxicated H doesn't stutter. 3, 656 words. _

**Ears and Eyes**

Hinata flinches when the stale smell of liquor and hot body odour reach her nose. And that's about a tenth of a second after she's opened the door. ( Kiba can notice in a hundredth of a second, but she's still proud of her sense of smell. )

Naruto hiccups and laughs loudly, catching sight of her in the doorway. "Hey Hinata! Didn't expect you to be here."

Hinata toys with the idea of finding out exactly HOW Sakura knew that Naruto was in a drunken stupor.

Naruto waves her in with a sort of cheery drunk look, but she can see that his blue eyes are sullen. She closes the door behind herself, somehow wishing that Shikamaru and Chouji would be in the house and that she'd be wishing for them not to be there.

Hinata watches like a small owl as Naruto sighs like an old man and sits on his chair, letting the hinges creak. Naruto doesn't look at her, looking at the floor near the left of himself, but still signals her like a waitress. His hand descends, fingertips brushing her lower thigh on the way down, and slaps the wooden chair opposite to the right of him on the table. "Sit," he murmurs.

She blushes lightly, and sits down neatly, barely making the rickety old, mismatched, rocking chair groan. "S'pose you'll wanna hear mah story right?" She nods. "I'll be your eyes and ears Naruto-kun."

For some reason Naruto throws his head back and lets out a loud bark of laughter. "Hoo, hee hee," He chuckles, wiping away a fake tear. "The many times that I've heard that one before." He mumbles.

"Eh? What happened?" But the blond man just shakes his head, sighing sadly. It seems like the lone tear that he'd wiped away was a real one, and not the type induced from laughter. Another one streaks down his striped cheeks, - transparent - just like he was in front of her, drunk and loose mouthed. And another one falls onto his lap, staining a small patch on his trousers a darker orange than the rest.

She feels bad, sitting there and doing nothing. She wants to reach out and rub his knee, or pat his hand, but she doesn't want him to lash out at her at the same time. She's learnt that she can never leave herself vulnerable in the company of an intoxicated man.

Reluctantly, - uncertain - she reaches out and gently touches the hand laying flat on the table. "Naruto," she says softly, thumb rubbing the flat surface of the back of his hand. "Please tell me everything." His head moves and his eyes meet hers. She wants to flinch and maybe cuddle him, and maybe just go 'aww'. Because the innocent, unprotected look in his eyes make him seem extraordinary, cute. He looks like a child, and her adult senses tell her that she needs to take care of said child, even if he isn't hers to take care of. "From, from the beginning. I want to help." _(know you better.)_

Naruto shakes his head, like a wet dog, and wipes his eyes, knuckles rubbing into his eye sockets. She notices with some extent of happiness that he hasn't moved his left hand, the one she's holding. The fox boy picked up his beer and gave it a swig, Adam's apple bobbing as he swallowed. She reached out on instinct, - a mistake - giving Naruto more alcohol at this stage won't do him any more good. She pulled her hand back before he had time to properly notice.

He set his beer down on the table, making a 'clank' sound as the hollow inside echoed. "Y'want some as well?" He asks. Hinata WAS going to decline and stay sober, but, to hell with it, she'll have a beer. She'll still stay sober. "Okay," she releases his hand as he gets up to the fridge. She wants to keep talking to him, so she pads along behind him, bending over next to him as they studied the contents of the refrigerator.

"_Hm_," Naruto hums, scratching his head, eyes observant. "We got Palm or cider, your choice." Hinata smiles. "Cider please,"

On the way back, Naruto punches a button on his small radio and twists the dial, turning on a pleasant sounding pop - classical station.

Naruto gives her a bit of a leering, wry smile, and clincks bottles with her. "So," Naruto exhales, hand running through hair, showing off a smooth forehead. "my story, ey?" Hinata simply nods. He's reluctant, not really wanting to share his thoughts with a person who he doesn't know so well.

"I guess the reason why I'm like this 's 'cos of Neji and Tenten getting together." Hinata's face expresses surprise. "I mean, I'm not jealous of Neji or anything, Tenten's a nice chick, but, _-Argh_, how do I put it?" He runs his hands through his hair, cheeks redder than when she first saw him drunk. "You're jealous of them." She realises. Naruto jumps like he'd just been under electric charge, and gives her a short glare.

He realises and let's go of his denial, he's gonna tell her everything, his way, without getting other emotions in the way. "Yes. Yes, I guess I am. I'm lonely." He lifts a finger up before she can say anything. "I do have my friends Hinata, but, like, I don't have someone who I can just TALK to, and they'd accept me for who I am," His mouth is pulled into a somewhat wry smile. Sad, and a bit cynical. "I'm talking to you." She says. Naruto blushes again and takes a gulp of his drink. "Yeah, but, someone special to me, who yeah, I can just talk to, but that I can hold in my arms y'know?" Hinata's heart longs for that person to be her, even though it had been so long since she had simply ignored those feelings. "Someone who I can share my stuff with, who I can share my love with."

Naruto's fiery azure eyes hold her captivated. It stuck a giant wrench in her heart.

"At the moment I'm full of love, but I've got no one to give it to."

She wants to say that she'd like to share that love with him, but WILL. NOT. do it for various reasons. Instead she rubs his hand again. And chuggs down a quarter of her cider in one go. She can feel it slosh around in her insides, and pities her liver.

"Hinata," Something is off with him, she can tell. His stomach rumbles. He clutches it. "I think I have to throw up. Like. _Now_."

Her first instinct is to jump out of the rocking chair and grab his arm and start hauling him to the sink in the kitchen (she doesn't know where his bathroom is) but he lets loose next to the sink, splattering her vest with some. She ignores it for the moment (ew ew ew ewew) and shoves his head in the silver dip, where he gratefully throws up in again, and grabs her vest for support.

After a minute of spitting and dry heaving, he rasps out: "I'm all wet. Ew." She smiles, cleans out the sink, and makes him wash his mouth out with some water. Hinata guides the blond back to his seat. "Y'know that you look really good in that rocking chair right? Like, he he, like a great, wise owl." (She's using the core of her abdominal muscles to stay perfectly straight and keep the chair from rocking.) She blushes even though she knows that he's just drunk rambling. She motions at his chunin vest, which he unzips and puts down on the table. He's left in a loose, cotton black shirt. He takes that off as well, incredibly compliant.

Hinata blushes and her untamed, girly 'Sakura and Ino' side hungrily takes in the eye candy in front of herself. Naruto-kun has certainly been to the gym a lot, she wants to touch those defined abdominal muscles. Bad girl Hinata, no touching!

Oh. Naruto's nipples are dusty brown. Yummy!

Naruto isn't even aware that her eyes have become the size of golfballs and that her face is bright pink, he's still rattling off crazy ideas. "You're so good at this, 've you done this before? Oh my god Hinata, I didn't know that you also drink!" She hastily shakes her head back and forth, hair flying. Oh, her dirty vest. Ew. She takes her one off as well, left in the standard navy shirt with the Uzumaki swirl on it.

Naruto gapes at her chest. She blushes.

It's rather obvious.

"Your story, Naruto-kun." She reminds him. "Right," He scratches his head.

"I'm jealous of Neji and Tenten's relationship. And Sakura dumped me again, so I'm feeling pretty low at the moment I guess." He scratches his cheek and downs some beer. "Ever since I was a small kid I was left alone by the grown-ups, y'know? Never told what was proper to eat and shit, and they always made me stand in the corner while the other kid's played." Hinata feels more depressed than when she entered his flat. "Where did you live?" Naruto slouches in his chair.

"Y'know that small, kinda orphanage called the _Oyasuminasai_? Yeah, I was brought up there until I was eight. Was a shithole. Mind you, there was this one pretty lady that always came into my room and read me stories. Think her name was Choumi or somethin'." He chuckles and downs some more, reaching for his extra bottle that he took from the fridge earlier on. "Anyway, one day when I was seven, Choumi tried to give me some sweets and the owner found out. She got fired." Hinata frowns.

She understands that he wants to tell her his story, right from the start, but how does this end up with him in a drunken stupor again?

"Anyway," Naruto states, eyes vague but eyebrows dissatisfied. "Choumi came and found me, about a few months ago. She's doing great. She's a medical ninja and stuff. Earns twenty five times the amount she got at the crap place." Naruto smiles.

"There's another reason as to why you're drowning yourself in alcohol and foreign liquor?" Hinata questions, quite uncertain.

Naruto's face is a bit dumbfounded. "Uh, yeah. She's taken a vacation of sorts." He stares off into space.

She feels slightly uncomfortable with his abrupt silence. "Should I ask what happened on her holiday?"

Naruto closes his eyes and shakes his head.

Hinata feels her stomach churn and flop.

"She visits me whenever she can, which isn't a lot actually. But the point is that she tries to anyway." He nods like an old man and scratches his nose and then his chin.

"Last time she got me a present. Top secret 'n' stuff." A full blown smile grew his across his face, eyes half lidded and twinkling in pleasure. "She shoved it into my hands and zoomed off like a platoon of Anbu troopers were after her ass."

Hinata ponders on how top secret Choumi's present is.

Naruto snaps his fingers. "Wait here. I'll go get it." Of course, he stumbles and curses as his face rushes to meet the ground, but with a rather red face, he gets up and stumbles into his dark room. She wonders if it's such a good idea to not follow him and make sure that he's not going to test gravity again.

After a minute or so - Hinata was sipping her drink and wasn't exactly counting the seconds ticking by - Naruto plops his ass down on his seat and thrusts something into her lap with a grinning face. She blinks. On closer inspection, it's a rather abused picture frame turned face down. She picks it up. Gasp. Naruto has gotten off his seat to stand next to her and stoop down to look at it as well. "Isn't she beautiful?" He asks dreamily. Usually Hinata would have told him that he shouldn't be gawping at older women like that - Kiba and his hideous magazines, they torment her to no end - but her eyes were glued to that one spot on the woman's stomach. A copper red haired woman's green eyes looked back at her, smiling an eternal feature of elegance. She wore a plain navy blue dress. Her arms were wrapped around her engorged stomach. "Naruto," Hinata gasps, thunderstruck. "Is this, . . . ?" Beside her, Naruto grins and nods vigorously. "I love it," His breath makes a few hairs flutter.

"Me too. She's stunning. And that's you in there?" She asks. Naruto nods and hums. A few more hairs flutter next to her cheek.

Hinata feels like she can stay sat on the rocking chair with Naruto bent over next to her, staring at his mother and him for ever.

Eventually, Naruto gently plucks the photograph out of her hands and sets it on the table, facing them. He sits back on his chair. He sighs and gives the picture a look.

Hinata notices the way that, after his elegant face plant in the carpet, his trousers have slipped a bit, and he's flashing some hip bone at her. Yummy, yummy, yummy. Ack. She's drunk. Argh. Stupid, annoyingly alluring apple tasted cider! Curse the alcohol. Naruto's necklace glitters in the overhead light.

"I can only guess that Choumi wanted me to keep it close. It makes me want to get to know who my mum was, and how Choumi managed to get her hands on it." Hinata nods dumbly. Abs, muscles, navel, pectoral plates, hip bone, drool.

"I'm sure that she wanted to keep you. Something must have happened to her." Naruto sighs and runs his hand through his spiky hair. "I wish that I could have just, . . . You know, have spent some time with her. I've always wanted to know a mother's love." His deep azure eyes sparkle with not yet formed tears. Hinata feels herself lurching towards him before she realises what she's doing. Oh. Wait. She's sliding out of her rocking chair. That's got to be why she and the blond are suddenly squished uncomfortably on the floor.

Naruto blinks. "Ow." He says.

She feels like an idiot. "Sorry. I fell out of my chair." She apologises, embarrassed. He shakes his head. "Nuh- Uh. 's alright." He nuzzles her shoulder with his nose. She blushes.

"Hinata,"

"Mn?"

"You're very squishy."

Gaaaah! No wonder her chest hurts! She's just gone and fallen on top of him, breasts first, then her back also decided to fulfil gravity control and squish her boobs against him. It hurts. A lot. So of course he can most likely feel her entire frontal assets. She turns bright pink. Stupid sports bra, it's not going to give her efficient cover tonight.

"A, . . . A mother's love?" She mumbles, still laying half on top of him, legs tangled next to his at a weird and slightly painful angle. Naruto pets her hair. "Nah, somethin' else." He murmurs.

"Friendly love?" Naruto shakes his head. "Nah,"

"Brother - sister love?" Naruto hums. "Something like that I guess."

She sighs. "Sorry about falling on top of you." _(For falling for you.)_

"Nah," Naruto shakes his head and strokes her hair. - she thinks that he likes it - "it's okay. I don't mind." She rests her cheek against his chest and sighs.

"Why does Sakura know that you went and got yourself drunk?" Naruto frowns lightly. "Ah," He says. His tone is troubled, slightly annoyed. "She came to PMS at me about how she can't find a decent guy after Sasuke's gone off on a year long mission. Pfft. Bullshit." Naruto's frown deepens. "No way," Hinata gasps. "Yeah, and she just dumped her anorexic ass on my chair, not even asking if she can come in, and then uses me as a snot and tear cleaner as she sprouts out all her boyfriend problems at me. Ché." He spits out. "I'm sorry _**I**_ ever cared, _Sakura_." He growls.

Slowly, they untangle themselves and sit back down on their chairs. They find out that the beer is up, so Hinata goes on over to the kitchen for more.

Bent over to look inside the small refrigerator, she can hear a snicker back at the table. A tiny peek with her Byakugan never hurt anyone. Her eyes glow silver. Through the back of her head, she can see Naruto admiring her butt. Gak.

She whips out two beers without really looking at their labels properly and hastily slams the door shut, trying to kind of hide her behind from him. Embarrassing.

She turns around and makes her way back to the table. She sets the beer cans down with a bit more force than necessary, and plops herself down. Naruto's face looks a bit guilty. He probably noticed the activation of her eyes.

Hm. Since when were their chairs always so close together? She's forgotten about the radio still being on, and it was humming out a romantic ditty, the woman singing about not wanting to go home tonight. Naruto's face seems a bit close. She can feel his breath on her face. It stinks a bit, but then again her breath probably doesn't smell like a mint and lotus mouth wash either. Naruto's lips are trying to say something, or maybe he's just trying out some lip syncing. She notices that his eyelashes are dark blonde, a feature she never noticed before. He seems awfully close . . .

"I should get going now Naruto-kun." She says, face still slightly pink. She takes her vest, his vest and shirt out of the washing machine and puts her jacket on, zipping it up.

"Yeah," The blond man smiles at her, scratching his head. "it was nice having you over." His tone is humble, a bit drowsy at the same time.

Together they walk to the door, Naruto opening it for her in a manly fashion. She giggles at him. She walks off into the dark night. She waves back at him. "Bye!" He does the same, a grin on his face.

Hopefully she's helped his let go of some of his troubles, if even only a little bit. Because she sincerely does want to help him. He's matured a lot over the years, she tells herself, but sometimes he does need the comforting and pampering of a child. Hearing about Choumi and his mother gave her great hope that Konoha didn't mainly consist of jerks, and it was lovely to savour the feeling with him, but . . .

Who knew that Naruto-kun was such a great kisser?

(( Hopefully she's filled that lonely gap in his heart with her warmth, but of course she can't read minds, can she? ))

**T H E E N D **

_Charlie : God it's so difficult to do! Gwah. Anyway, I know that it's probably not really what you asked for, but if you read it through a bit, maybe you'll remember the 'want to hold someone' part. I wonder what happened in the gap that you didn't get to read ey? =e.e= Ha ha, I'm mean. _

_Hopefully this satisfies your tastes Ricardo! I'm open for requests, and maybe if you badger me enough you can annoy me enough to write the missing part that I deliberately left out! :D _

_Please review__ and say what you thought was funny, cute, romantic, stupid, bad, should be edited, your view on things, etcetera. (I'm KINDA fed up of the 'so cool! Please update soon!' reviews.) _

_Oyasuminasai means 'good night'._


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